COLUMBIA, South Carolina (AFP) — Defeated Democratic nominee John Kerry Thursday warmly embraced Barack Obama's White House run, implicitly attacking Hillary Clinton as a representative of stale old politics.
The moment was nigh for a far-reaching transformation of the nation, Kerry told a pumped-up Obama rally in South Carolina, "and I believe that this moment is the moment that we should make Barack Obama president of the United States."
The Massachusetts senator, who lost the 2004 election to President George W. Bush, said he "dared to hope" then that a fractured country might be reunited in Bush's second term.
"It didn't, but it will when Barack Obama is president," Kerry said in a fiery speech in Charleston that did not mention Clinton by name, but was full of veiled references to her attacks on Obama's lack of experience.
Taking on Clinton's charge that the Illinois senator is offering the American people "false hopes," Kerry said: "My friends, the only charge that rings false is one that tells you not to hope for a better tomorrow.
"The cynics may have spoken, but it's the people who will decide."
Obama burst on to the national stage with an electrifying speech at the 2004 Democratic convention that nominated Kerry in his doomed bid to unseat Bush.
Kerry still carries some sway among Democratic donors, fundraisers and activists who could assist Obama in his nail-biting contest against the former first lady for the Democratic nomination this time round.
Kerry's endorsement might also influence other members of the Democratic establishment who have so far stayed neutral between Obama and Clinton.
Heading into contests in Nevada and South Carolina, the race is finely poised after Obama took the Iowa caucuses only to see a resurgent Clinton win in New Hampshire Tuesday.
"I want to thank John Kerry for his support in this campaign but more importantly for his service to this nation," Obama told the rally, reprising his retooled stump speech that promises "Yes, we can."
Attacking the "chorus of cynics," he offered "not just change as a slogan, but real change, fundamental change, change that you can believe in -- that's why I'm running to be president of the United States of America."
"In the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything that is false about hope," added the man bidding to be the first black president of the United States.
Kerry's vice presidential running mate in 2004, John Edwards, is back in the race this year, and is campaigning hard in his native South Carolina after disappointing finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire.
In a statement, Edwards said he respected Kerry's decision to endorse his rival in the 2008 contest.
But he added that this election was "about the future, not the past," promising to take on the status quo on behalf of the powerless.
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